Samsung WB2200F Review -- First Impressions

A lot of point-and-shoot cameras these days can seem like much of a muchness. They look similar; they have similar features and shooting experience. Not so, the 16-megapixel Samsung WB2200F -- this is a point-and-shoot in SLR's clothing, complete with a portrait grip.

At face value, it's a curious choice. You get the bulk of an SLR or mirrorless camera without their key advantage: the comparatively huge sensor. You do, however, save vastly on lens size and cost thanks to the tiny imager of the Samsung WB2200F.

On an APS-C camera you'd need an 800mm lens to match the WB2200F's telephoto reach, and no such first-party lens is even available for Samsung NX-mount. That means the need either for a lens and adaptor, or for another body and mount altogether. Either way you'd be spending a small fortune on a lens that would need to be shot tripod-mounted due to its size and weight.

With the Samsung WB2200F, you have a body with approximately the same width and thickness as a mirrorless camera such as the NX1000, but approximately double the height to accommodate the portrait hand grip. The 60x optical zoom lens adds only around the same depth to the body as would an 18-55mm kit optic on a mirrorless camera, but it gives an entirely different level of zoom reach. And of course, you have handling akin to an SLR with portrait grip -- including a duplicate shutter button -- something which could prove rather attractive too, if you shoot a lot of portraits.

And it's not just the 1,200mm telephoto of the 60x zoom lens that will prove handy, either. If you often find yourself struggling to get far enough from your subjects to fit them in the frame, you'll welcome the extremely generous 20mm wide angle. With a maximum aperture of f/2.8, the wide angle is even pretty bright, although it does fall to f/5.9 by the telephoto position. And the lens also includes optical image stabilization, plus a dual-speed zoom control. There's even Samsung's handy i-Function button, used to make settings adjustments quicker and more intuitive, and seen on many of its NX-mount interchangeable lenses.

But on the flip side of the coin, that 1/2.3-inch, 16.3 megapixel CMOS image sensor is tiny compared to those of Samsung's NX-series cameras, and other cameras with a similar body size. Surface area is in the region of 28.5mm2, far less than 10% of the surface area of a typical APS-C sensor (closer to 370mm2). That is, to some extent, offset with a backside-illuminated design that decreases the area given over to circuitry, and increases the ratio of active light-gathering area, but there's only so much that the technique can manage. The result: a sensitivity range of ISO 80 to 6400 equivalents.

Images are framed and reviewed on a 3.0-inch LCD monitor with HVGA (~460,800 dot) resolution, or on an electronic viewfinder with a rather low resolution of 201,600 dots. You have a choice of Program, Aperture-Priority, Shutter-Priority or Manual exposure, or a Smart Mode which can choose between Beauty Face, Continuous Shot, Landscape, Macro, Panorama, Action Freeze, Rich Tone, Silhouette, Sunset, Low Light Shot, Fireworks, or Light Trace scene types, among other options.

And you can shoot movies, too. Here, your resolution options top out at Full HD (1,920 x 1,080 pixels; 1080p), with lower-res HD (1,280 x 720; 720p), VGA (640 x 480), and QVGA (320 x 240) options available. All of these have a fixed 30 frames per second capture rate, but there are also two extremely high frame rate options suitable for extreme slow-motion video, albeit at equally extreme low resolution. At a 384 x 288 pixel resolution, you can capture 240fps video. Drop still further to just 176 x 128 pixels, and you'll manage a whopping 360fps.

Images and movies are stored on Secure Digital cards, including the higher-capacity SDHC and SDXC types, and about 17MB of internal storage is provided. Connectivity options include Micro (Type D) HDMI high-definition video output, Micro USB 2.0, plus Wi-Fi wireless networking (with support for remote live view), and NFC (for easy setup with Android devices). Power comes from a BP-1410 battery, said to yield up to about 600 shots on a charge.

Official pricing and availability hadn't been disclosed at press time.